There is need for Text to XML semi/automatic conversion?

[Francesc]

Hi, I'm new at this newsgroup and I want do ask some questions and
opinions about this subject.

I'm developing an application focused in a very specific task: clean
and labelling text documents with user-defined structural tags (title,
cite, date, paragraph, itemList, ...). It makes the typical
pre-processing tasks needed for computational linguistics in order to
work with big corporas to use statistical tools.

But I'm worried that this field be too small/specific. I choosed it
because it's a field that I know and where I'd some contacts, *but* I'm
not sure if research departments of universities are able to spend
money/purchase software, or may be they are too used to the free/open
source world.

For this reason I'm looking for some other field where the task of
adding structural labels to text be needed (specifically converting
unstructured and format-oriented documents to structured
function-oriented XML documents). May be some area on publishing, but I
think that they will not be interested in "small" desktop applications.

Please, any of you had worked for or listen about some business with
this kind of need? Do you think that there is demand for legacy
document conversion in small business?

Some info about the application:

- Importing form main document formats (TXTs, HTML, RTF, others?).
- GUI Based for interactive labelling (active learning techniques,
similar to the OCR programs).
- Interactive labelling used to "train" the program by automatic
induction of statistical rules (based on textual, lexical,
typographical and structural properties of the block).
- After trainning the labeller can be used in batch-processing in a
full-atonomous mode.
- Exporting to user-defined XML (any estandard? docbook? TEI?)
- A lot of cleaning and normalization small tasks: removing headers,
de-hyphenation, reconstruction of paragraphs with broken lines,
removing non-textual or decorative elements as (asccii art), ...

I think that legacy document conversion may be a need for many
bussinnes, but I'm not able to found them, may be some of you can give
a clue?

thanks very much in advance.

[d_l_jones]

Francesc wrote:

Hi, I'm new at this newsgroup and I want do ask some questions and
opinions about this subject.

EDITED FOR BREVITY

I think that legacy document conversion may be a need for many
bussinnes, but I'm not able to found them, may be some of you can give
a clue?

thanks very much in advance.

You might want to look at companies like Exegenix (www.exegenix.com).

There are a number of vendors who provide XML conversion software.

[ffbenavent]

Thanks for the link, this program seems to be very similar to what I'm
doing, but as often this company is focused to "big services". I wonder
why there are not "small desktop applications" to help taggers to
automate its labelling tasks.

The good new is that exists market to hold a big company as Exegenix,
sure that exists market to hold an small company as mine. :)

Francesc

[manusmriti]

Francesc wrote:

I'm worried that this field be too small/specific. I choosed it
because it's a field that I know and where I'd some contacts, *but* I'm
not sure if research departments of universities are able to spend
money/purchase software, or may be they are too used to the free/open
source world.
Yes Fransesc, such research efforts are undertaken by Universities and
publishing houses round the world. The single most important reason for
the same is that XML is customizable to very large extents (as compared
to HTML). And many such organizations have (and still are) spending
money and efforts onthese front. But I haven't heard of any commercial
application that can convert text to XML at a stretch.
For this reason I'm looking for some other field where the task of
adding structural labels to text be needed (specifically converting
unstructured and format-oriented documents to structured
function-oriented XML documents). May be some area on publishing, but I
think that they will not be interested in "small" desktop applications.
Now, that sounds interesting, and yes, there can be publications (I am
not sure on this front) that may need to convert unstructured
information to XML. But again, isn't XML format-oriented itself? The
basic purpose of text to XML conversion (in publishing houses and
universities) is that the XML-ized documents add to a data bank, from
which they can be searched/sorted out. I believe, this could be
possible only by structurizing them.
Please, any of you had worked for or listen about some business with
this kind of need? Do you think that there is demand for legacy
document conversion in small business?
I also have been part of one such organizations.
- A lot of cleaning and normalization small tasks: removing headers,
de-hyphenation, reconstruction of paragraphs with broken lines,
removing non-textual or decorative elements as (asccii art), ...
These issues can be taken care of by defining a macro in MS Word. The
folw would then be directed through MS Word itself (Word to text, text
to XML)
I think that legacy document conversion may be a need for many
bussinnes....

The most possible options (my perception), would be publications that
pay too much emphasis to typography (those can be typography-oriented
too), or those who prefer keeping their text in undefined/spontaneous
structures. Such mags may not be archiving/publishing their issues for
a recall/research purpose.

Thanking you,

Manu Stanley

A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.